


A burning memory

by Crafty7angel05



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Blasphemy, Crowley Was Raphael Before Falling (Good Omens), Fallen Angels, Gen, M/M, She/Her Pronouns For God (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 00:02:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29708568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crafty7angel05/pseuds/Crafty7angel05
Summary: Crowley contemplates the Fall, before and after.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Kudos: 16





	A burning memory

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve resigned to the fact that I’m much better at writing short contemplative pieces and occasionally poetry. Written after I got in my feels about Everywhere at the End of Time (again)

He never really knew why he had been shunned by the same beings who once adored him.

The line between love and hate must’ve been finer for those who obsessed over bloodshed and war. There were definitely plenty of them. Why else would they advocate for it so much in the so-called Great Plan? 

In one Anthony J. Crowley’s opinion, it must’ve been because even the highest echelons of Heaven did not deny the pride of victory. Down there, they called it a Sin. A Deadly Sin, in fact. Ironic, sure, but present in every last one of them nonetheless. Some would find the very idea contradictory. He found no trouble believing that they could, considering the likes of Gabriel being in their ranks. Another way in which both sides, Heaven and Hell, were more alike than they would’ve preferred. 

No, no, it was because of curiosity. A plague that was inflicted upon mankind, but not them. Or so they thought, until one of their own questioned the plans that She and the universe laid ahead of them. 

(He knew now that the Ineffable Plan did, in fact, live up to its name, as the bureaucracy didn’t seem to understand it fully either. Bit too late for him, unfortunately.)

He Fell in fire and flame, into the sepulchre and sulphurous brimstone stinging every orifice, clogging his throat until he could no longer sing. When the falling part of the Fall was over, he tried to cry out, with no breath to do so. Tried to drown, then, but Hell had no water. 

When the pain, emotional and physical blended together, was over, he was alone. He was, simply described, empty, and could no longer feel Her love. His heart—or more accurately his soul, as hearts were assigned to corporations exclusively—ached with the loss. 

He was in with the thickest of them. An Archangel, no less. And then he was gone. They must have forgotten him by now. Fine by him, who would want to live in a realm where those asking questions faced punishment?

Maybe that’s why people fear burning memories. Not because of the physical fire, but because losing a memory means losing the moment forever. Losing someone who knows us, before we’re dead and gone. And if we don’t have anyone to remember us, why do we live?

It was different for him, he knew, because after he had tempted Eve into the Original Sin, he had found someone who would remember him. They would live and remember each other through thousands of lifetimes. 

It is also ironic, that Aziraphale’s chosen pseudonym’s surname, being an angel and all, was Fell. 

Aziraphale had faith that not all angels behaved like the ones at the top, all false smiles and vicious reprimands. There is a certain feeling they give him, and it came to him when they spoke to him before Armageddon began. The feeling comes all at once, the realization dawning on him as if he was once again reminded of all the things wrong in the world. 

Bad apples, he calls them, as if there were any good ones. Centuries, eons, in many mythologies, apples have been a fruit of temptation. Yet, that was partially Crowley’s fault, he supposed. 

Aziraphale believed he could do good for humanity and enjoy the wonders they thought up throughout it all. In that way, Crowley thinks, they were similar. They were of the same original stock, regardless of appearance. Their camaraderie blossomed with the knowledge of the ways they were alike, and jokes were made about the ways they were not. 

He took great pains for Hell not to recognize him as nice. He wasn’t, anyhow. He simply had morals, and he stuck to them; they were part of his character and they developed from his experiences. He liked to think himself a great big collection of experiences. He wouldn’t hurt people directly if he could help it, and would try to save the younger generation when he could. Anyhow, what kind of demon was he if he couldn’t go against the norm every once in a while?

Humanity, perhaps, remembered him. Not him now, but what he had been. Not eyewitness accounts, for no humans had existed when he Fell. Through visions, perhaps. And that was the best he could hope for, for his work to be remembered, even if the now-demon behind the work was not. 

He’d be a burning memory, and that was alright.


End file.
